1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a medium transporting apparatus, which is mounted on a recording apparatus main body for recording with respect to a medium to be recorded, which includes a transporting unit for transporting the medium to be recorded in a transport direction and a transport path that has the transporting unit on a path where the medium to be recorded can be reversed to its front and rear sides when guiding the medium to be recorded which is transported by the transporting unit, and a recording apparatus including the medium transporting apparatus.
In the invention, the recording apparatus includes various kinds of apparatuses such as an inkjet printer, a wire dot printer, a laser printer, a line printer, a copier, a facsimile or the like.
2. Related Art
In a related art, as described in JP-A-2006-298605, a medium transporting apparatus mounted on a recording apparatus main body includes a roller which is an example of a transporting unit and a reverse path which is a transport path. Among them, the roller is installed so as to be able to transport a paper which is an example of a medium to be recorded in a transport direction. In addition, the roller has been installed so that it can be driven by the use of the power of a motor installed in the recording apparatus main body side.
Furthermore, the reverse path has been formed in a ring shape when seen from a side thereof and installed so as to be able to guide the paper transported by the roller and reverse the paper to its front and rear sides. Thus, the medium transporting apparatus can reverse the paper, which the recording on a front surface has been completed, to its front and rear sides in the reverse path in a state where it is mounted on the recording apparatus. Furthermore, by returning the paper which has been reversed by the medium transporting apparatus to the recording apparatus main body side, the recording can be performed with respect to a rear surface of the paper in the recording apparatus main body side. That is to say, it can achieve double-sided recording. In addition, after there has been recording on a front surface of a first paper, the sides can be reversed to record on a rear surface, and subsequently, after a front surface of a second paper has been recorded, the sides can be reversed to record on a rear surface.
However, the medium transporting apparatus has a structure in which the roller is driven by the use of the power of the motor of the recording apparatus main body side. Thus, it is difficult to control the roller independently from the recording apparatus main body side. That is to say, it is difficult to independently change the driving speed of the roller. In addition, in order to make the apparatus main body as small as possible, the reverse path is installed such that the length thereof matches with the length of the maximum size of the recordable paper.
Herein, in case of a paper having a length smaller than the length of the maximum size, the distance of the paper transported in order to reverse both sides of the paper in the reverse path is the same as in case of the paper having the maximum size.
Thus, the time from when the recording to the front surface of the paper has been completed to when the recording to the rear surface of the paper is performed is increased to the extent that the length of the paper is short. Namely, to the extent that the length of the paper is short, an unnecessary movement distance is increased, therefore the time from the completion of the recording to the one surface to the start of the recording to the other surface is lengthened, thereby resulting in a large loss of the time. Furthermore, even when the length of the paper is relatively short, consequently, a so-called throughput, which is a use time from the start of the recording to the discharging per a sheet of paper, may not be improved.